RMK gets us started.
I've heard you (and Kevin Smith when he guested I think) talk about 'guest' directing on TV shows. Where you're not regular staff, etc. It's always made me wonder if you know any story about a director not gelling with a cast or crew, and being replaced mid-week.
It’s happened twice on shows I’ve been involved with.
The first was years ago. The star really clashed with the director. I was one of the show runners so to avoid shutting down I had to step in and finish directing the actors (I knew nothing about cameras at that time so the hired director came back and did all the technical stuff.)
The second time was on ALMOST PERFECT (our series starring Nancy Travis). I got a call the night before camera blocking that our director was passing a kidney stone and would not be available the next few days.
So I had to go in and camera block on the fly. There was no way to prepare since I didn’t know how the show was blocked.
It actually proved to be a pivotal point in my directing career. The fact that I was able to do it fairly easily meant I was really getting the hang of it, camera-wise.
From Lisa:
As a comedy writer, have you ever written any episodes for a clown character or just any writing for any clown?
Or do you just hate clowns like many others do?
I only hate clowns that aren’t funny.
But I can’t recall ever writing a clown into any project we were involved in. People in animal suits, sure. What writer hasn’t? But no clowns. However, I did direct an episode where someone dressed as a jester for Halloween. Does that count?
Not a lot of room for clowns on MASH.
And speaking of MASH, Unknown asks:
Ken, I have a Friday Question about the lack of smoking on MASH. At the time the show was set (early 1950's) A LOT of people smoked, and I recall reading that the cigarette companies gave every soldier 2 free cartons a months. So why is there very little if any smoking on MASH? Was it a note from Standards and Practices since cigarette ads had recently been banned from tv? Or a decision by the creators?
Primarily Standards & Practices. And I was okay with that. Why glorify smoking? Yes, it was a little unrealistic that they didn’t smoke. But it was also unrealistic that they spent eleven years fighting a war that only took two.
On BECKER, same network, we did have the main character smoke and just floated the message from time to time that it was bad for you. Same on the MARY show. Katey Sagal’s character smoked (primarily to annoy Mary), but there too mention was made of the dangers of tobacco.
And finally, from Bob Paris:
Ken: Here is a Friday question involving a joke I heard a standup comedian do years ago on the Letterman show. "My wife and I met online. We didn't think our parents would understand so we told them we met at the University of Phoenix." My question is would the joke be better or worse if the punchline was: "... so we told them we met in college... at the University of Phoenix." Please analyze, if you don't mind.
It works either way, but I would probably opt for not adding “we met in college.” University says that. What the audience needs to know is that it’s a correspondence college. So I might say “we met on the campus of the University of Phoenix.” If you know it’s not a real school that might help the joke.
But it was probably fine as is. Did it get a laugh?
What’s your Friday Question?
22 comments :
A joke is basically built on surprise. The extra clause of "so we told them we met in college," only delays the punchline and partly telegraphs the gag, muffling the revelation.
My father was in the Army in Korea, where he developed a two-pack-a-day Winston habit. I'm allergic to smoke, and it used to make me miserable as a kid. I still remember sitting at the dinner table, where no matter where I sat, the smoke from his Winston in the ashtray somehow always knew to drift straight toward me. I would try to surreptitiously blow it in the other direction, which irritated my dad to no end. He thought my attempts to keep from suffocating were a sign of disrespect.
He died of cancer at 66, one year after my mother died of cancer at 65. She didn't smoke, but she lived in the same house with him for over 40 years. I suspect a connection. Thanks for your patriotic generosity, tobacco companies!
The clown picture reminds me that I watched Eric Stonestreet on Finding Your Roots this eek. He developed a character called Fizzbo the Clown as a kid. His character on Modern Family, Cam, occasionally did work as Fizzbo the Clown. (Cam and Eric also both grew up on farms, BTW.)
Interesting about smoking because I'd thought of that, and I noticed that Potter and Klinger smoked cigars, which, obviously, Harry Morgan and Jamie Farr did. I seem to recall Trapper smoking cigars as well. As for cigarettes, you could see that Larry Linville had a pack in his pocket.
Uhh . . . there was a lot of smoking on M*A*S*H. Both Henry and Potter regularly had cigars dangling out of their mouths, and Klinger also occasionally loved a good cigar. Potter even taught Radar how to smoke a cigar (even though he used to steal Henry's cigars when he wasn't looking).
Chuckles the Clown's first appearance on The Mary Tyler Moore Show was almost as funny as his last appearance -- Chuckles only appears at the end, to tell them that the election results came in hours ago, after a blizzard shut down WJM's phone and teletype lines, forcing Ted Baxter to stay on the air overnight until a winner could be declared. The final gag here being Ted's too exhausted to announce the winner, so Chuckles does it just as Lou walks back into the studio from being out all night with the mobile truck -- "When I give people a job I never question what they do, Mary. So I'm never going to ask you why you put Ted Baxter in a clown suit." (bonus points here for the mayoral candidates being named after Lloyd Turner and Gorden Mitchell, who gave Ken his first TV credit on "The Jeffersons" five years later).
Showing smoking on tv is only authentic if they also show folks hacking up gobs of nasty yellow phlegm out of their lungs every morning. Since that isn't glamorous, they don't; there goes any claim to authenticity. I'm thankful that MASH didn't glamorize it by showing just how prevalent it really was.
I well remember being a kid at various gatherings and basically unable to breathe. The air would be blue, and the walls behind my parents' favorite chairs were yellow with nicotine. And, every single member of my family who smoked ended up with emphysema and other lung complications, dying from related complications, or had heart attacks at a very young age.
I've never seen "Mad Men," but I understand that there was a lot of smoking on that series also. Presumably to make it look more authentic to the time period. Although, from what I understand they didn't smoke tobacco. It was some kind of "herbal" cigarette.
I'm old enough to remember cigarette advertising on television. I've mentioned this before, but my mom told me that some of my first words were quoting a cigarette commercial. Thankfully, I never smoked cigarettes even though many of my peers did.
By the way, many of you may already know this, but it's still legal to smoke inside casinos in Nevada.
It's not one of your episodes, Ken, but on M*A*S*H B.J. dresses as a clown for the Halloween episode, "Trick or Treatment." That's also the one where George Wendt get a billiard ball stuck in his mouth.
M.B.
P.S. Besides the lack of smoking, their hair was always too long on M*A*S*H. "Happy Days," too.
Minority view here. I think rather than telegraphing the joke, adding "in college" accentuates the punch line. And I think the pacing is better if you add "in college" and then wait a beat before the punch line. But, maybe this is why I'm just a very funny oncologist and not a comedy writer.
As soon as I saw the photo, I knew it would be my question :)
Thanks for answering Ken.
My question is on Harvey.
At the height of MeToo movement you said everyone in Hollywood knew Kevin Spacey was gay.
Did everyone know about Harvey too? It seems many knew and his behavior was common knowledge.
https://www.insider.com/celebrities-knew-harvey-weinstein-sexual-abuse-ronan-farrow-catch-kill-2019-10#quentin-tarantino-7
A few extra thoughts about the Phoenix joke:
I'm sure no sane comedian (if that's not an oxymoron) would waste an appearance on Letterman with material that hadn't been thoroughly road-tested, so it's safe to assume that the performer in question here probably tried many variations on the gag before saving the one that had gotten the best response. We can figure any questions about phrasing had already been asked and answered by that point.
A one-liner like this doesn't have a lot of working parts. We can basically break the setup down to the question, "What's a website that sounds like a physical location?" The point the commenter here seems to be raising was whether the answer was so esoteric that it needed to be explained within the joke itself. I think the placement of "University of Phoenix" defines itself without needing extra understanding. Again, the comedian had probably determined that it worked with an audience as is, and the act was good enough to make the Letterman show, so that's another context we need to take into account.
If I'm not enough of a windbag when it comes to the subject of honing the verbiage in a joke, we can always turn to one of Mark Twain's frequent diatribes on the issue. He once wrote, "I am dead to adverbs; they cannot excite me." (which would probably spark Kurt Vonnegut to rail against the pretension of semi-colons). Twain went on to adverb-advise, "Substitute 'damn' every time you're inclined to write 'very;' your editor will delete it and the writing will be just as it should be."
There's a lot of smoking in old movies which is expected of course but what I find amazing is that so many times all the actors just suck down cigarettes non-stop.
Ken, apropos smoking. What's the story with characters that do smoke on a show, but look as though they have never before smoked?
Characters in both tv shows and movies are unconvincing smokers. (Dr Becker included.)
Why have them smoke in the first place?
My dad told me that when he was in the service (During the Korean War but lucky for him assigned to serve in Germany) they had cigarette breaks. You got to take the break only if you smoked so, of course, everyone did. Luckily he didn’t get addicted and never smoked again.
The Phoenix joke doesn't work for me.
If the parents aren't savvy enough to know about online dating, why would they be savvy enough to know that the University of Phoenix is an online school?
IMO, the joke only works if the parents already know; but the joke starts off with their lack of knowledge of online activities.
Am I in the minority? I bought my first computer in 1980, should I have known?
Reading the comments reminded of a guy I knew who took acting classes in college. He told me one day the lesson was how to smoke a cigarette. Another day the lesson was how to make out with a girl.
Hollywood taught the public to smoke because celebrities were not about to be told not to smoke and tobacco companies made a fortune out of selling its products, even though most knew it was deadly even way back when.
Then Hollywood and other smug types told the public they were were bad for smoking and looked down at it and took it out of movies and eventually banned it. Meanwhile, no one was going to tell them they couldn't over indulge in pot or harder drugs, so shows like Saturday Night Live made them all cool until the stars started dying. Then they decided the harder drugs weren't good and they backed down on encouraging the public to do more than alcohol and pot. They succeeded in getting pot into the mainstream and hard liquor on TV ads with big stars once again getting people to indulge.
Many of the people who pooh-pooh those horrid cigarettes have no problem lighting up joints in closed spaces such as movie theaters, stinking up everywhere they go with a stench that is a blend of farts and landfill. But if Oscar and Emmy winners think it's great, hey, go ahead. Long as you don't smoke.
Audiences also cheer references to heavy drinking on television to this day, yet "old people" like Dean Martin are considered terrible for doing the same thing. Meanwhile livss are still shattered and the death toll keeps mounting.
Yes, this is a highly negative look at something that might be the result of abuse rather than careful use. That's another debate. However the point is that the attitude of smug superiority is as putrid as the smell.
In Australia we call a work break a smoko. We still do, even though barely anyone smokes, and no smoking is allowed in the workplace.
***Questions***
(1) You discussed how the script for "The Jeffersons" got your career going. But you also said the show was not one that you really cared for. Once your writing career was working out, did you need to personally like a show to be enthusiastic about writing an episode or does an assignment for a show fall under keeping your career going and making sure the rent gets paid?
(2)I never seem to hear you discuss certain comedies of the early to mid-1970s such as "Sanford and Son" "Chico and the Man" "Good Times" One Day at a Time" "Welcome Back Kotter" "Happy Days" "Laverne and Shirley" and "Mork and Mindy." Are there any stories with submitting a script for any of those shows?
Lately, the online university that's eating up the most ad space is Southern New Hampshire University.
For short, SNHU.
Or as a lot of people I know call it, SNOO-YOO!
It's a different kind of joke, of course …
millertime said...
>> If the parents aren't savvy enough to know about online dating, why would they be savvy enough to know that the University of Phoenix is an online school?
The parents aren't supposed to know the joke, hence that it's a joke. The audience on the other hand does need to know UofP is online only. But if someone doesn't get it, they don't get it, they just think it means they met at college.
P.
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